Multisensory integration of musical emotion perception in singing

We investigated how visual and auditory information contributes to emotion communication during singing. Classically trained singers applied two different facial expressions (expressive/suppressed) to pieces from their song and opera repertoire. Recordings of the singers were evaluated by laypersons or experts, presented to them in three different modes: auditory, visual, and audio–visual. A manipulation check confirmed that the singers succeeded in manipulating the face while keeping the sound highly expressive. Analyses focused on whether the visual difference or the auditory concordance between the two versions determined perception of the audio–visual stimuli. When evaluating expressive intensity or emotional content a clear effect of visual dominance showed. Experts made more use of the visual cues than laypersons. Consistency measures between uni-modal and multimodal presentations did not explain the visual dominance. The evaluation of seriousness was applied as a control. The uni-modal stimuli were rated as expected, but multisensory evaluations converged without visual dominance. Our study demonstrates that long-term knowledge and task context affect multisensory integration. Even though singers’ orofacial movements are dominated by sound production, their facial expressions can communicate emotions composed into the music, and observes do not rely on audio information instead. Studies such as ours are important to understand multisensory integration in applied settings.

Destigmatising Schizophrenia: An Investigation into the Effects of Different Causal Explanations upon Stigma

<p>While many people with mental illnesses are stigmatised, those with schizophrenia are the most severely stigmatised group (Crisp, Gelder, Rix, Meltzer, & Rowlands, 2000; Marie & Miles, 2008; Pescosolido et al., 1999). A vast body of psychology research has been devoted to investigating how education – particularly education about the causes of schizophrenia – can reduce this stigma that is attached to schizophrenia. While there is great support for the notion that education in general can reduce stigma (e.g. Costin & Kerr, 1962; Griffiths, Christensen, Jorm, Evans, & Groves, 2004; Ritterfeld & Jin, 2006), there is still disagreement regarding exactly which set of causal factors the general public should be educated about – biogenetic or psychosocial? Until now, only three previous studies (Lincoln, Arens, Berger, & Rief, 2008; Schlier, Schmick, & Lincoln, 2014; Walker & Read, 2002) have experimentally compared teaching a purely biogenetic causal explanation to teaching a purely psychosocial causal explanation. The results of this research appear to be somewhat contradictory leading to the need for another, more robustly designed experiment. In the present research, two experiments were conducted in which participants’ level of stigma was measured after they were given a biogenetic causal explanation of schizophrenia, a psychosocial explanation, or given no causal explanation. It was predicted that participants given a causal explanation would show reduced levels of stigma compared to participants given no causal information, and that there would be a significant difference in the stigma reduction effectiveness between types of causal explanation. Contrary to these expectations, the results of Experiment One showed no reduction in stigma when participants were given a causal explanation compared to no causal explanation, and revealed no significant differences in stigma reduction efficacy between the biogenetic and psychosocial causal explanations. Experiment Two utilised the same basic paradigm as Experiment One but with the addition of more convincing causal explanations and a manipulation check. The results of Experiment Two gave evidence that both a biogenetic and psychosocial causal explanation successfully reduces discrimination compared to giving no information on the causes of schizophrenia. In addition, a purely biogenetic causal explanation was also found to successfully reduce belief in other stereotypes compared to a psychosocial causal explanation or no causal explanation. Thus, I conclude that stigma can be effectively reduced by providing education about the causes of schizophrenia, and that a biogenetic causal explanation is a more effective stigma reduction tool as it reduces multiple types of stigma. Strengths, limitations, implications and future directions are discussed.</p>

Destigmatising Schizophrenia: An Investigation into the Effects of Different Causal Explanations upon Stigma

<p>While many people with mental illnesses are stigmatised, those with schizophrenia are the most severely stigmatised group (Crisp, Gelder, Rix, Meltzer, & Rowlands, 2000; Marie & Miles, 2008; Pescosolido et al., 1999). A vast body of psychology research has been devoted to investigating how education – particularly education about the causes of schizophrenia – can reduce this stigma that is attached to schizophrenia. While there is great support for the notion that education in general can reduce stigma (e.g. Costin & Kerr, 1962; Griffiths, Christensen, Jorm, Evans, & Groves, 2004; Ritterfeld & Jin, 2006), there is still disagreement regarding exactly which set of causal factors the general public should be educated about – biogenetic or psychosocial? Until now, only three previous studies (Lincoln, Arens, Berger, & Rief, 2008; Schlier, Schmick, & Lincoln, 2014; Walker & Read, 2002) have experimentally compared teaching a purely biogenetic causal explanation to teaching a purely psychosocial causal explanation. The results of this research appear to be somewhat contradictory leading to the need for another, more robustly designed experiment. In the present research, two experiments were conducted in which participants’ level of stigma was measured after they were given a biogenetic causal explanation of schizophrenia, a psychosocial explanation, or given no causal explanation. It was predicted that participants given a causal explanation would show reduced levels of stigma compared to participants given no causal information, and that there would be a significant difference in the stigma reduction effectiveness between types of causal explanation. Contrary to these expectations, the results of Experiment One showed no reduction in stigma when participants were given a causal explanation compared to no causal explanation, and revealed no significant differences in stigma reduction efficacy between the biogenetic and psychosocial causal explanations. Experiment Two utilised the same basic paradigm as Experiment One but with the addition of more convincing causal explanations and a manipulation check. The results of Experiment Two gave evidence that both a biogenetic and psychosocial causal explanation successfully reduces discrimination compared to giving no information on the causes of schizophrenia. In addition, a purely biogenetic causal explanation was also found to successfully reduce belief in other stereotypes compared to a psychosocial causal explanation or no causal explanation. Thus, I conclude that stigma can be effectively reduced by providing education about the causes of schizophrenia, and that a biogenetic causal explanation is a more effective stigma reduction tool as it reduces multiple types of stigma. Strengths, limitations, implications and future directions are discussed.</p>

Secure Attachment Priming Amplifies Approach Motivation for Infant Faces Among Childless Adults

Existing studies have indicated that priming secure attachment alters adults’ neural responses to infant faces. However, no study has examined whether this effect exists for motivational behavioral responses, and none of the previous studies included adult faces as a baseline to determine whether the security prime enhances responses to human faces in general or infant faces alone. To address this limitation, the current study recruited 160 unmarried and childless adults in the first phase, and all of them completed a battery of questionnaires, including the Interest in Infants, the Experiences in Close Relationships (ECR), and State Adult Attachment Measure (SAAM). A week later, after priming, 152 (76 security-primed vs. 76 neutrally primed) participants completed the SAAM and a behavioral program assessing their motivational responses to both adult and infant faces (i.e., liking, representational, and evoked responses). A manipulation check showed that the security prime was effective. Then, generalized linear mixed-effects models (GLMMs) showed that security priming enhances adults’ liking, representational, and evoked responses (three components of the motivational system) only to infant faces and not to adult faces. Moreover, hierarchical regression analysis indicated that, even after security priming, there was a substantial linear relationship between positive motivation toward infant faces and the state of adult secure attachment. In summary, this study demonstrated for the first time that promoting the state of adult secure attachment can effectively enhance the effect size of the baby face schema. The current results were interpreted according to Bowlby’s view of the attachment behavioral system.

Is there magnocellular facilitation of early neural processes underlying visual word recognition? Evidence from masked repetition priming with ERPs

An influential theory in the field of visual object recognition proposes that fast magnocellular (M) information facilitates neural processing of spatially more fine-grained but slower parvocellular (P) information. While written words can be considered as a special type of visual objects, it is unknown whether magnocellular facilitation also plays a role in reading. We used a masked priming paradigm that has been shown to result in neural facilitation in visual word processing and tested whether these facilitating effects are mediated by the magnocellular system. In two experiments, we manipulated the influence of magnocellular and parvocellular systems on visual processing of a contextually predictable target character by contrasting high versus low spatial frequency and luminance versus color contrast, respectively. In addition, unchanged (normal) primes were included in both experiments as a manipulation check. As expected, unchanged primes elicited typical repetition effects in the N1, N250 and P3 components of the ERP in both experiments. In the experiment manipulating spatial contrast, we obtained repetition effects only for the N1 component for both M- and P-biased primes. In the luminance versus color contrast experiment, repetition effects were found in N1 and N250 for both M- and P- biased primes. Furthermore, no interactions were found between M- vs. P-biased prime types and repetition. Together these results indicate that M- and P- information contributes jointly to early neural processes underlying visual word recognition.

Influence of memory processes on choice-consistency

Choice-consistency is considered a hallmark of rational value-based choice. However, because the cognitive apparatus supporting decision-making is imperfect, real decision-makers often show some degree of choice inconsistency. Cognitive models are necessary to complement idealized choice axioms with attention, perception and memory processes. Specifically, compelling theoretical work suggests that the (imperfect) retention of choice-relevant memories might be important for choice-consistency, but this hypothesis has not been tested directly. We used a novel multi-attribute visual choice paradigm to experimentally test the influence of memory retrieval of exemplars on choice-consistency. Our manipulation check confirmed that our retention interval manipulation successfully reduced memory representation strength. Given this, we found strong evidence against our hypothesis that choice-consistency decreases with increasing retention time. However, quality controls indicated that the choice-consistency of our participants was non-discernable from random behaviour. In addition, an exploratory analysis showed essentially no test–retest reliability of choice-consistency between two observations. Taken together, this suggests the presence of a floor effect in our data and, thus, low data quality for conclusively evaluating our hypotheses. Further exploration tentatively suggested a high difficulty of discriminating between the choice objects driving this floor effect.

Influence of memory processes on choice consistency

Choice-consistency is considered a hallmark of rational value-based choice. However, because the cognitive apparatus supporting decision-making is imperfect, real decision-makers often show some degree of choice inconsistency. Cognitive models are necessary to complement idealized choice axioms with attention, perception and memory processes. Specifically, compelling theoretical work suggests that the (imperfect) retention of choice-relevant memories might be important for choice-consistency, but this hypothesis has not been tested directly. We used a novel multi-attribute visual choice (MAVC) paradigm to experimentally test the influence of memory retrieval of exemplars on choice-consistency. Our manipulation check confirmed that our retention interval manipulation successfully reduced memory representation strength. Given this, we found strong evidence against our hypothesis that choice-consistency decreases with increasing retention time. However, quality controls indicated that the choice-consistency of our participants was non-discernable from random behavior. In addition, an exploratory analysis showed essentially no test-retest reliability of choice-consistency between two observations. Taken together, this suggests the presence of a floor effect in our data and, thus, low data quality for conclusively evaluating our hypotheses. Further exploration tentatively suggested a high difficulty of discriminating between the choice objects driving this floor effect.

Manipulating situational risk in human-automation research – Validation of a new experimental paradigm in virtual reality

Although situational risk has often been postulated as an important contextual factor in the literature of human-automation research, experimental evidence is scarce due to the difficulty operationalizing risk in an ethical way that is comparable to what real life operators can be exposed to. This study serves as a manipulation check of a newly developed experimental paradigm, in which a subjectively experienceable situational risk can be manipulated as part of a virtual reality environment. It is varied by the altitude participants must carry out the tasks in, including the possibility of virtually falling in case of a mistake. Results revealed medium to large effect sizes in subjective as well as objective metrics signifying a more pronounced perception of risk in the higher altitude condition. This is evidence for a successful manipulation of situational risk in a new paradigm that meets the same requirements of other multi-task environments used in human-automation research.

Degree Centrality of a Brain Network Is Altered by Stereotype Threat: Evidences From a Resting-State Functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging Study

Previous studies have found the effects of stereotype threat (ST) on cognitive processes, emotions, and motivations which could account for the underperformance in domain tasks. Efficient brain function does not require the function of different brain regions during specific tasks, but it does require the brain networks on which information is transported. Based on these, the effects of ST on the degree centrality under the resting state of brain regions related to these processes were investigated under math-related ST. The results showed that RSDC was decreased in the left hippocampus and left middle occipital gyrus (MOC), while RSDC was increased in the left precuneus, the right angular gyrus (AG), and the right superior parietal gyrus (SPG) under ST. Interestingly, we also found that the right-left anterior temporal lobe (ATL) and the right hippocampus were negatively correlated with manipulation check (MC) score in the ST group, while the right-left ATL and the right hippocampus were positively correlated with MC score in the control group. These results might reflect those individuals who attempted to inhibit the negative emotions induced by the negative stereotypes under ST conditions while increasing the self-relevant processes by retrieving episodic memory or autobiographical memory.

When is there a more-credible effect?

Hoorens and Bruckmüller (2015) reported that people are more likely to judge comparison statements to be true when the comparison is framed as \textit{A is more than B} than when it is framed as \textit{B is less than A}. Skylark (2021) recently provided further evidence for this \textit{more-credible effect}, but found that it did not emerge for all stimulus sets. In particular, there was very little effect of comparative when participants evaluated the truth of statements comparing the amount of land required to produce certain foodstuffs. The present report describes two further pre-registered studies that probe the generality of the more-credible effect. Study 1 used the same land-use comparisons as Skylark (2021) but increased the masses of the foodstuffs from 1 kilo to 1000 tons (the idea being that 'less than' framing might only reduce credibility when the compared quantities are large). A manipulation check found that the change in stated mass increased the subjective size of the items, but there was still little effect of comparative on judgments of truth: more-than statements were judged true about 3\% more often than less-than statements, and the effect was not reliably different from zero. Study 2 asked people to judge the truth of statements comparing the CO2 production of pairs of countries selected from the most polluting countries in the world. A modest, 'significant' more-credible effect emerged, with more-than framing boosting perceived truth by approximately 5\%. Exploratory cross-study comparison indicated that the more-credible effect did not meaningfully differ between the two studies. The factors that determine when, and how far, more-than framing boosts the credibility of comparative statements remains an important topic for inquiry.